The Hook of Woodland Heights

This is an ok movie, definitly a good effort for the people who made this with an almost nothing budget. A guy escapes from a mental hospital, has no hand, and puts a fork thing on his handless arm. Nothing special, very low budget like usual. This movie can only be seen on the Attack of the Killer Refrigerator video.

My review was written in November 1990 after watching the picture on Donna Michele video cassette.

Released on VHS with "Attack of the Killer Refrigerator", this is a 40-minute short film shot on video with a $3,500 budget in 1987 in Worcester, Massachusetts, by Mark Veau and his partner Michael Savino. Poorlymade-up by Robert W. Allen stars as an escaped mental patient who sticks a barbecue fork in the stump where his hand used to be and cuts up various youngsters.

There's precious little talent displayed by these tyro filmmakers, yet the video tape cues unintentional hilarity with the inclusion of a 26-minute local tv show "Behind the Scenes' hosted and produced by gushy Sean Nelson. It plays straight but is an unwitting parody of such documentaries. Comments at the "gala local premiere" of "Hook" are naive in the extreme.

The film is soooo intensely awful it's amazing. So awful in fact, that it's awesome. From the villain's undeniably bad makeup to the shotty special effects, you'll be sitting in complete disbelief. But wait--just when you think it's over and your night is about to once again descend into mediocrity...the behind the scenes documentary starts. You'll be perplexed to say the least as you learn everything about the production and more importantly the premier party for the movie. Keeping in mind that this is also packaged back to back with the short "Attack of the Killer Refrigerator", you should already be trying to find a copy at your nearby rental store.

First of all, this short movie is extremely hard to find. It's a low budget one and never officially released so it was up to depravity lane to search and at last find it. So I did, only to be available on NTSC VHS. So for an European that means trouble but friends in the US converted it so I could watch it. The storyline is simple, some serial killer escapes from an asylum to go on a killer spree. It's all done in a very good way, i would like to give a big cheer to the cameraman, beautifully filmed, knowing that it dates from '88, camera's were very heavy then. Anyway, the acting could have been better but it's home made so this is what you get. The editing is okay too, some scene's are a bit too long but it only clocks in at 40 minutes. The blood flows but you never see the 'hook' going into the flesh, when they show it it's a close up so you know that it's a 'special effect'. No gore, only bloodletting as said. Should they have made it 30 minutes it would have been a lot better. But what makes it an ode to the slashers, the stupid victims, the slashers, the hero who dies, the girl who solves the problem almost, the open ending to make ...part 2. Well if you ever find it buy it because it contains Attack of the killer refrigerator.